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During our ten year history, we have worked to grow a community of researchers with an ever-widening realm of expertise. The important word here is community — our mission is to connect researchers who might have otherwise never known about each other.

We are proud now to announce our next venture, Agency in the Physical World. It follows our intellectual trajectory over the past programs, drawing deep connections from the most fundamental descriptions in physics and cosmology, to description in terms of observers, agents, and conscious beings. The program is a partnership between FQXi and the Fetzer Franklin Fund, a philanthropic organization dedicated to supporting foundational questions at the frontiers of physics, biology, and consciousness research.

The program features our familiar components for building community: a conference, essay contests, Large grants, and Mini-Grant rounds. Our first essay contest has just launched, and the Large Grant round will open in the coming weeks — please stay tuned for that announcement.

The program also supports research by the two “B-Area” centers — B for Boston and (San Francisco) Bay — formed during FQXi’s Physics of the Observer program. The work of the B-Area centers will try to better understand agency in physical systems through their capabilities to learn, to predict, to process information, and to choose. The centers also will serve as hubs for visits and other interactions that connect all researchers around the world funded by the APW program.

We envision the APW program will lead researchers to question how we define, identify, and measure agency, intelligence, and consciousness, and to investigate how these concepts fit into our current physical theories. These questions are contentious and difficult, even within the context of FQXi’s usual ambit of thorny topics.

I hope that this question can lead good understanding of nature's most important Fundamental issue.

Only questionings without open and awakened mind can't we succeed it.

I have some difficult to understand, the relations of FQXI's Foundational questions and Fundamental of the nature, but I am sure that "Most of the fundamental ideas of science are simple and can be expressed in a language comprehensible to everyone".

I hope, FQXI not to be a school of complex Mathematics which finds out allready known answer

However, I will put my entry to this contest, as soon as possible.

In 2010, I explained the Natures fundamental as simplest, smallest thing of all.

On the other hand, Ibelieve that current physics fundamental problems amongst dealing with fundamental terms such as original meaning of "Elementary" "Quanta" "Atom" .

I found that biggest and misleading one off all is the term "massless"

What is Elementary Quanta?

What is Light Quanta?

What is elementary Charge?

What is Photon?

What is Elementary particle?

What is elementary energy?

How these terms are related each other?

Is E=mc^2 fundamentally applicable to all matter?

Why light is affected by Gravity?

What are Gravitational waves?

Why we still discover Einsteins theory?

Why Newtons simple statements Gravity is still most important of all Physical science?

Is any scientific theory that we can overall spectrum of physical sciences?

Which is natures dominant structure/shape at all level?

Which way philosophical/ scientific idiea from the known history we come to here?

Any possibility to continue it?.......

"All these fifty years of conscious brooding have brought me no nearer to the answer to the question, 'What are light quanta?' Albert Einstein.

In general (when dealing with light EM), I have different actions to Feyman's the three basic actions;

-Action #1: A photon goes from place to place.

-Action #2: An electron goes from place to place.

-Action #3: An electron emits or absorbs a photon.

My opinion

-Action #1: A photon does not goes from place to place, but its energy is tranfered as wave(force influence/gravitational wave/dynamics).

-Action #2: An electron does not goes from place to place, but its energy is tranfered as wave(force influence/gravitational wave/dynamics).

-Action #3: An electron emits or absorbs a photon's energy, but not photon itself.

Every particle's total energy must contain same quanta (certain quantity), of elementary energy, that equals the total quantity of elementary particle's(Photon's) energy.

Since elementary mass 1.7x10^-36 kg, by dividing any particle's Mass into the elementary mass, we obtain ratio that equals to quantity of photons (note integer number).

Every particle's total mass must contain same quanta (certain quantity), of elementary mass, that equals the total quantity of elementary particle's(Photon's) mass.

Since elementary energy 1.6x10^-19eV, by dividing any particle's energy into the elementary energy, we obtain ratio that equals to quantity of photons (note integer number).

This is a potentially dangerous topic. I hope the research chosen is carefully considered for potential for harm or misuse.I.e. detrimental to individuals and humanity as a whole. The ethics must be considered. An undemocratic trans-human agenda of a small minority can not be allowed to take agency away from human beings.

It may well be too late to get the genie back in the bottle. All of the ways we interact with our computers and other digital information about us can be used or misused. Not just to show us what we want to see but to manipulate thoughts feelings and actions.

Perceptions of reality are normally generated from sensorily received information and internal processing but our 'wetware' can be hacked. It was once science fiction but not anymore. People are being experimented upon without their consent. In violation of the Geneva convention and in violation of our God or universe given free will. What becomes of democracy and weapon security under such circumstances, (for example)? Control includes burning pain, involuntary muscle contraction, flashes of light, sounds, hallucinations, thought intrusion, and sexual sensations.

Unfortunately it sounds insane which only helps the perpetrators continue their development of systems that enslave humanity, ultimately. I object to be treated like a cockroach.

Keep in mind we really have been "hacking" each other since the dawn of time. Given the advent of modern information systems, it certainly has been stepped up a notch, but that just means we have to become even more aware of the forces at work. Ultimately it is the same forces and laws of nature that have functioned from the dawn of time and they are not always pretty, but there are ways to turn the tables as well.

I think one of the largest socio-economic factors at work is our evolving understanding of economics and how money functions as an economic medium and social contract, rather than personal property. Effectively we own money like we own the section of road we are using.

The current problem being that since we do view it as personal property, this medium is being used as a feedback loop to siphon all value out of the rest of society, by those controlling this mechanism, rather than having it circulate to the benefit of the whole society, which does truly guarantee its value.

As such, we are at a bit of a Versailles moment, where hereditary political rule lost sight of the social function it served and became totally self centered and now the banking system has lost sight of its larger function.

Basically government is analogous to the central nervous system and finance to the circulation system of the body, so we are progressing along elemental evolutionary routes.

Consider how much control of power and money is what drives those social control mechanisms, so breaking down the private banking system and turning it into a public utility would be hopefully the end state. Though neoliberalism is planning on trading their piles of public debt for even more public properties and siphoning ever more value out of the environment and society, taking back control of the financial system will be the opposite goal.

John, I accept your point about hacking. I'm not talking about a good argument, a well timed ad. or propaganda.Rather the by-passing of the senses and directly accessing the brain and peripheral nervous system with EM signals.Allowing remote control of perceptions and sensations. As well as detection of brain activity allowing mind reading, after training of a system able to match inputs with outputs, gaining ability the more digital input is match-able to brain response. There is potential for intellectual property theft, access to uncensored thoughts and potential for control via shame, emotional and physical states being triggered affecting what a person does. Pain and pleasure can be administered with potential to train or induce learned helplessness, or as remote abuse.As severe muscle contractions can be caused I have no doubt death could be caused by inducing heart spasm. This technology is a Pandora's box, a danger to the free will and individual agency of human beings.It divides us into puppets and puppet masters, human or AI, Our bodies machines to be hacked by who ever has the means. It really isn't OK , a dangerous topic.

Remote Extraction of Biological Signals A link to a you tube video presenting a more optimistic view of the technology and not considering the health risks, security risks, privacy risks, risks to democracy, risks to social order and other potential for abuse.

Quote "I am promoting research into the remote extraction of biological signals using touch-less technologies. I am against invasive technologies as they increase health risks, restrict mobility, or can be identified visually by others. I am also promoting research into whole body biological signal extraction. The body radiates measurable energy, and with our understanding how the regions of the mind operate, I believe that we could read the body's overall generated signals (perhaps diagnose illnesses?)."

Bear in mind the technology itself is probably far more advanced than declared publicly. I believe it is being illegally tested on human subjects.

My work has only been concerned with understanding the physics of the universe and what reality is in that context. It has not been weapons development, espionage or torture. I am not an enemy combatant, nor have I expressed radical political or religious views. I have taken care to keep my conversations about physics and related philosophy. Experimentation on humans without their knowledge and informed consent is illegal and immoral. I have tried to express my non co-operation by mentally repeating the word 'no', resulting in the sensation of having a rope pulled tight across my mouth being molested. Unspoken thought have been immediately followed by seemingly affirming strong whole body contortion. I am fearful that actual bodily harm is being caused not just sensations. Searching mainly you tube I find that I am not alone in experiencing such things. I realize speaking up is possibly foolhardy at best and deadly at worst. This is right at the heart of the question of agency, and freewill.

If these experiences are endogenous psychogenic phenomena without external actualized cause they can still be regarded as manifestation of deeply troubling concern about where research into experienced reality and agency ultimately leads. To technology used for the control and abuse of innocent people. The potential for misuse has to be considered along with potential benefits. The cost in terms of free will and individual agency, the experience of being an individual with a degree of self determination, is too high.Once developed how can misuse of the technology by government, by criminals, by people with dubious ideologies etc.be prevented?

Link to a you tube video about patents for mind control in particular via pulsed signals from TV and computer screens. Able to manipulate sensations and emotions and transmit subliminal information. Here is the url if you would rather not use the link, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6VDyO3id7_A

I have experienced the eye lid fluttering and deep purple and yellow patterns , which I have been wondering about. Thinking they were perhaps some kind of seizure aura and migraine aura respectively. Yet there are also other sensations and emotions which are strange and uncharacteristic, which, together with the previously mentioned experiences, are, it is explained in the video, also symptoms of exposure to subliminal pulsed signals.

The philosophy of agency includes the idea of agency being initiated by the agent and as intentional action. Agency (Stanford Encyclopedia of philosophy). However the question 'who is the agent ?' deserves consideration since the behaviour of an organism can be altered, such as by infection by a parasite. The behaviour being potentially detrimental or deadly to the host but advantageous to the parasite. Here is a magazine article about the parasite Toxoplasma gondii affecting rat and human behaviour. How Your Cat Is Making You Crazy If a person's behavioural responses, stemming from internal drives can be affected by non self agents directly affecting the brain or body, or by brain washing via external inputs, the person might be caused to act contrary to prior instinct and learning. The one acting is acting on motivation that was involuntarily induced. I think this raises questions of morality, responsibility of the individual actor, and of the instigating party, as well as 'who is the agent?'

I've just now been listening to a radio story[1] which relates to "the problem of evil" and "Agency in the Physical World". I posted this comment to them:

There is no point discussing “the problem of evil” without asking: 1. What is evil? ; and 2. What can usefully be done about it? But, as doing something practical about evil relies on understanding what evil is, the main question becomes: what is evil?

Clearly, there can be no evil without free will, where free will is the, at least partial, ability to choose and implement personal outcomes. A car that is involved in a deliberate hit and run accident is not an entity with free will; a knife that is involved in a stabbing murder is not an entity with free will: neither the car nor the knife could be described as “evil” because they are things that are completely under the control of a human being.

But if the human being’s physical and mental outcomes have been, as many physicists assert, 100%, completely controlled by law of nature forces and external influences since the moment of conception, then can the human being’s actions be described as evil? Clearly not. Only if these physicists are mistaken, and a human being has the, at least partial, ability to choose and implement personal outcomes, can the human being’s actions be described as “evil” or “good”.

Given that living things do indeed have free will, the only variables that can influence a human being’s actions, are upbringing and education and the societal environment.

If I understand well this new venture, it means that we intend to explore beyond the “Physics of the Observer”. In other words, this is about questioning how much the observer actually contributes to the “observation”. `

Under this chapter, we already know that the process of “observation” using instruments, does place a sort of squeeze on the fuzziness of a quantum system,...

If I understand well this new venture, it means that we intend to explore beyond the “Physics of the Observer”. In other words, this is about questioning how much the observer actually contributes to the “observation”. `

Under this chapter, we already know that the process of “observation” using instruments, does place a sort of squeeze on the fuzziness of a quantum system, causing it to settle on a definite and limited number of actualized states. The reason is that the boundary caused by the squeezing causes the loss of infinities in the stochastic distribution thereby allowing the establishment of a specific wave regimen. In other words, measurement creates a box where a definite wave function can “materialize”. This shows that, in the quantum world, we do recognize the contribution of the action (agent) of the observer on the observation.

But there are other contributions of the observer to the observation. There are already known sensorial and mental contributions like colors, temperature, space etc. and most of our instruments are extensions of these senses. Our conceptual contributions are far more discrete. Space, for example, was replaced by space-time. This was done short of saying clearly that, as such, space does not exist. The idea (concept) of space is but the knowledge and consideration of points at the same time when they are not “at the same”.

This will be the difficult part of this program; to remove our knowledge from the equations. This knowledge is of course required for a description of some event. But, when it comes to understanding how the universe works by itself, our knowledge, consideration should not be part of it. In other words, no part of the universe requires our knowledge of it in order to proceed.

Only when this abstraction has been effected, will we be able to give existence (substance) and freedom to evolve (cause) to a universe that has done so for billions of years. The old mantra of physicality for physics will have to make place for what is logical. This mantra was meant to steer us clear of the trick of the mind. We now know that our senses play more tricks than our mind. We should trust the logic of our minds to figure it out.

So, this program will (should) make the distinction between an image, a perception that happens only for us, and focus on what exists and happens without the need for us to be around. In doing so, we will eliminate the scale barrier we introduce between the quantum and the macroscopic world. It is all the same, down to the last turtle...

Δ this variable, δ that variable: physics represents number change with the delta symbol, thereby hiding the number change problem.

Physics assumes that numbers (e.g. the numbers representing energy, momentum or relative spatial position) just somehow change. But physics can’t explain what’s driving “smooth” number change in the universe, let alone what’s causing quantum jumps in number values. Clearly, laws of nature describe the outcomes of smooth change of number, but they don’t explain why a number should ever change in the first place.

But with regard to the "Agency in the Physical World" program: what is an agent if the agent is not a cause and source of a number change outcome that is otherwise unexplainable? Because if a number change outcome is otherwise explainable, then it would be absurd to posit that any agent was involved in the situation at all.

Take a billiard ball that has been impacted by the tip of a billiard cue, and by collisions with other balls and the cushions, in a game of pool. Clearly a billiard ball is not an agent: the numeric outcomes for the billiard ball are fully explainable by the laws of nature and by the situation (the billiard cue impact, the other balls and the cushions).

But if the billiard ball were an agent, then it would have to be the cause and source of a numeric outcome that wasn’t entirely due to the billiard cue impact/ other ball/ cushion situation, and wasn’t entirely due to the laws of nature.

Naturally, we can expect that the physicists involved in the APW program will try to bowdlerise the meaning of the word “agent” and try to transform it into something entirely anodyne, or absurd.

How not wonderful, how evil and oppressive, is a universe where your fate is sealed: no matter that you think you have agency to act and choose, it was ordained by the laws of nature that you were going to act and think this way since the beginning of the universe.

This is physics’ dystopian vision of reality, where “agency” is just a fancy label for events that are in no way logically different to non-agency events, and where an “agent” is just a fancy label for physical matter that is in no way logically different to a non-agent.

Physics’ dystopian vision of reality which, due to education, now inhabits the back of the minds of young and old educated people the world over, has set the scene for apathy and hopelessness.

An agent is enabled or constrained by it's environment. A lion on a chain may choose to sit paws crossed or legs out straight ahead. It can not take itself to the opposite side of the room beyond the reach of it's chain. So what agents do is not just up to them but the context.

As for 'number change' I think it is more helpful to think of existence and change as essential aspects of the material universe. Which might be said as the universe consist of matter and energy, and conservation of energy means change never runs out but just takes different 'forms'.

The word “agent” comes from the “Late Middle English (in the sense ‘someone or something that produces an effect’)” [1].

While you seemingly believe yourself to be logically equivalent to a billiard ball, or to a dry leaf blown around by the wind, I am an agent that “produces an effect”.

While the billiard ball and the dry leaf are 100% the victims of events beyond their control, the agent is a genuine partial cause of its own events and outcomes. I’m saying that this is the nature of reality: when traced back, the agency aspect of reality is the ultimate cause of all change in the universe. So, I’m saying: local, mindful [2] partial knowledge, and partial agency; but you seem to be saying: global mindless inevitable “change”.

Are you one of the masses of educated people that have uncritically accepted physics’ dystopian vision of the nature of reality, so that they believe themselves to be nothing but intricately configured billiard balls: 100% the victim of events and forces beyond their control?

Lorraine, I didn't say the lion was incapable of any self directed agency but was saying what it could do was constrained by the context. It can try to move to the other side of the room but can't because of its chain. I don't see how you get from that that I think of myself as a helpless billiard ball or dry leaf.

As I wrote a week ago: "Naturally, we can expect that the physicists involved in the APW program will try to bowdlerise the meaning of the word "agent" and try to transform it into something entirely anodyne, or absurd."[1]. Once the physicists have bowdlerised the meaning of the word "agency" so that it means nothing much at all, then these physicists can say that they believe in "agency".

I think that a weak and entirely emasculated version of "agency" is what you mean by "agency".

I think that what you mean by the word "agency" is so entirely emasculated, that it is logically equivalent to non-agency. I think your “agent” is logically equivalent to a billiard ball, or a dry leaf blown around by the wind.

But I agree that agency is somewhat “constrained by the context”. It’s just that I think that your phrase “constrained by the context” is code for “determined by the context”.

You wrote "But I agree that agency is somewhat “constrained by the context”. It’s just that I think that your phrase “constrained by the context” is code for “determined by the context”. The chain does not determine the posture or location of the lion ( and consequent mass, heat and carbon dioxide distribution in the room), within the limits it imposes.

You wrote "I think that a weak and entirely emasculated version of "agency" is what you mean by "agency"." No, I just don't think agents exist and act without any context. What the agent can and can't do is enabled or constrained by the environment it is in, or has experienced. Physical environment, other agents, and systems, organizations, society. It is many layered. It also ties in with nature and nurture having roles to play. Two collies from the same litter could be trained. One as a drug sniffer and one as a sheep herder. Now the two dogs have different abilities, and deficiency in ability relative to the other, enabling and constraining what they can and can't do, as well as constraints applied by the handlers. Such as where and when the dog will work.

The scenario you present is this: given the all the history of a thing, given all its environmental influences, and given the laws of nature, all outcome measurements are 100% as would be expected. You imply that this is a model of an agent.

But if all outcome measurements are 100% as would be expected, then it would be absurd to posit that any agent was involved in the situation at all.

So your scenario is not a model of an agent or agency: its a model that can only be used to represent a thing like a billiard ball.

Lorraine, I don't think the material future already exists so it can be thought of as open to new events. Complexity and chaos mean that there can not be 100% certainty. Minute differences can cause large differences in outcome. If I have trained my dog meticulously so that it always obeys a command, I can not be 100% certain it will perform perfectly at an upcoming obedience show. It may eat something that affects electrolytes in its blood so it is unwell or it might be hit by a car or be frightened by thunder and run away and so on. The influences are spread over many scales as well as different levels of organization. I think there are too many parameters and variables to take account of all of them with ultimate accuracy, and from all perspectives. So while there can be confidence there can't be certainty. I do agree that some things seem to have intrinsic ability to effect change, given the right circumstances whereas other things are inert or passive. You mention atoms as agents. I have been thinking the Noble gases are very different to the Alkali metals when it comes to intrinsic ability to effect change. You have DNA as an agent. I have been wondering whether it can be likened to a book, which also has the intrinsic ability to effect change,( in the reader, and how the reader uses the information, in the case of a book) but is itself passive as it is read. If DNA is an agent, is a book an agent?

You misunderstand chaos and complexity. Every single outcome of a mathematical chaotic/complex system is determined by whatever rule/rules are driving the system. So every outcome is 100% as expected, because rules, and nothing but rules (and computing power behind the scenes), are driving the system outcomes. No miraculous, magical events emerge from such a system. Such a system is never at any time “open to new events”.

There IS “100% certainty” that, when all calculations are done, all future outcomes in such a system will be as expected. You mightn’t know what a clockwork puppet (idealised as a mathematical system) is going to do in the next 10 minutes, but no sane person would think that new unexpected events emerged.

“Minute differences” don’t happen in such a mathematical system. Something has to cause “minute differences”, because the system itself is fully defined, and the system itself is not causing “minute differences”.

Re “I think there are too many parameters and variables to take account of all of them with ultimate accuracy, and from all perspectives”: We are talking about a thought experiment here, i.e. we are looking at the logic of the situation.

Re “a book, which also has the intrinsic ability to effect change in the reader… Is a book an agent”: On the contrary, a book has no “intrinsic ability to effect change in the reader”: a book is environmental information, not essentially different to any other environmental information.

Lorraine, you use the phrase "as expected". Can I ask expected by whom? Since the complexity and chaos of everything considered together is incalculable. Climate science is hindered by insufficient computing power to calculate to extremes of decimal places. The numbers have to be truncated making them approximations. Therefore opening to error in the predictions made because the tiny differences in the input values can result in large differences in outcome in a chaotic system. The system can behave unpredictably. That is just thinking about climate. By open to new events I meant not already existing ahead of current time.You wrote "There IS “100% certainty” that, when all calculations are done, all future outcomes in such a system will be as expected. Who/what is doing these calculations? Re. the puppet- some grains of dirt might become trapped in the mechanism and it malfunctions unexpectedly. The cleanliness of the mechanism not having been taken into consideration. Are you sure when you write "On the contrary, a book has no “intrinsic ability to effect change in the reader”. Do you think all people would be unaffected, unchanged, by reading for example "Human behavior in the concentration camp" by Elie A. Cohen? As all people have by nature and nurture different brain structure at the level of neurons and an individual response may also depend on what else is happening concurrently with reading the book, not just previous learning and memory, how can the calculation be performed to give 100% certainty?

As I repeatedly said, complex systems are mathematical models. By virtue of computers, the idea of complex systems exists in people’s minds and expectations. These mathematical models never self-fluctuate, and never “quantum jump”: all outcomes are as expected because they are deterministic systems, i.e. these mathematical models are unlike reality in crucially important ways. Unfortunately, you have believed the hype and assumed that reality is an elaborate deterministic system, where a human being is logically equivalent to a billiard ball or a dry leaf blowing in the wind.

No matter what its contents, a book has no inherent ability to effect change in a person any more than walking down the street or watching a YouTube video. The content of “the change” is merely normal subjective experience of information/emotion about the subject’s environment: where the book, the street and the video are included in the subject’s environment.

But you were suggesting that a book might be an agent. But an agent is something that changes itself (e.g. the relative spatial position or configuration of hands or vocal chords): this is how an agent can do what it wants to do in the wider world, e.g. a human being might use his hands to switch an electric kettle on to heat water. I haven’t noticed any books with hands or vocal chords lately, or books that change their own relative spatial position or configuration.

Lorraine, I wondered if you considered a book an agent as you supplied this definition "The word “agent” comes from the “Late Middle English (in the sense ‘someone or something that produces an effect’)”" Which is a rather open definition. Also you have said you consider DNA an agent. DNA is also an information store that is 'read' (transcribed). Now you have supplied "But an agent is something that changes itself "as further definition. Isn't the DNA acted upon by other molecules such as methyl groups affecting folding, and high energy particles or molecules that can cause damage, and alterations can happen to the code when it is subsequently 'repaired'. Aren't these actions of other molecules like hitting the snooker ball rather than action or any kind of will of the DNA itself. Though it does fit "a substance that produces a particular effect:" It seems the definition of the word is constraining what and isn't included rather than there being a fundamental difference in ability to cause an effect of natural and manufactured things. A pacemaker produces a particular effect, as does a treadmill. An mRNA ribosome complex would fit "An agent is also a chemical substance, organism, or natural force that produces a particular effect by its action." (Definitions from https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/agent)

It is not the case that “the DNA [is] acted upon by other molecules such as methyl groups affecting folding, and high energy particles or molecules that can cause damage…”: this assumption of purely deterministic billiard/snooker ball-type interactions is a misreading of particle interactions, atomic interactions, and molecular interactions. These interactions require a...

It is not the case that “the DNA [is] acted upon by other molecules such as methyl groups affecting folding, and high energy particles or molecules that can cause damage…”: this assumption of purely deterministic billiard/snooker ball-type interactions is a misreading of particle interactions, atomic interactions, and molecular interactions. These interactions require a quantum interpretation of what happens to make sense of them. In these quantum interactions, there are discontinuous changes in energy and momentum for example, i.e. temporarily, energy and momentum are not always conserved.

You say: ""An agent is also a chemical substance, organism, or natural force that produces a particular effect by its action." (Definitions from https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/agent)". But what is “its action”? The Oxford dictionary says: Action - “A thing done; an act”; Act - “A thing done; a deed”; Deed - “(literary) An action that is performed intentionally or consciously”[1]. So combining the definitions, we might well say: "An agent is … a chemical substance, organism… that produces a particular effect by an act done intentionally or consciously”.

The point is: what is it that is acting? I.e. if outcomes are represented by categories of information (energy, momentum) and numbers represent the quantity of these categories, then what is causing the discontinuous number change in quantum interactions and events? I’m saying that the only candidates are the particles themselves. I’m surmising that when particles and antiparticles annihilate each other, the energy information produced is due to the information relationships that the rest of reality experienced with respect to the particles, not due to particles being made out of energy. Instead, I’m contending that the essential nature of particles (and thereby atoms, molecules and living things) is matter, mind and cause.

I agree with you. On the one hand, the universe has its own built-in logical causality i.e. the universe evolves by itself. This unique and logical causality is demonstrated by the effectiveness of maths driven physics giving us a working picture of the universe.

On the other hand, as biological entities, we carry along preset behaviors inherited from being the vehicles of replicator DNA. But beyond that, it is free will. This free will is not directed by any specific logic. In a sense, we are this special unit of the universe exploring and effecting (agent) illogical solutions, stuff that could never happen from the logic of the universe alone, like the great pyramids or the Eiffel tower. We are like expending energy and dispersing matter in ways no other natural system can. We can choose our actions to be entropic or negentropic, i.e. going against the grain of time and logic of the universe.

I agree [1]. I would say that agency (free will/creativity) is movement or reconfiguration of oneself relative to the grain of, or the logic of, the rest of reality. As such, agency is a power at least equal to the laws of nature.

So, agency is necessarily a fundamental aspect of reality, and not an ability or capacity that can arise just because an entity is an advanced-level living thing. What living things do have because of their complexity, is a much greater ability to algorithmically/logically analyse information about oneself and one’s situation in the universe.

Because agency is a fundamental aspect of reality, physical agents are necessarily particles, atoms, molecules including DNA, and living things (but chairs, billiard balls, computers, and robots are not agents - they are merely aggregates). Naturally, there is only limited scope for agency (free will/creativity) in particles, atoms and molecules.

Re “This free will is not directed by any specific logic”:

I would agree. Being the power to move oneself relative to the grain of the rest of reality, another way to envision agency (free will/creativity) is: the power to create new information relationships. I would go further than that and say that all information relationships (i.e. law of nature relationships) have somehow been created by this agency, and that agency precedes logic.

1. I agree, though I think that “time” is merely logically derived information, not a fundamental aspect of the universe.

" I agree, though I think that “time” is merely logically derived information, not a fundamental aspect of the universe. "

On this last assertion, I beg to differ. Read my essay in this year's contest. There is a dynamic process that makes everything, the canvas of it all. We call it Time, but it is THE substance with THE built-in cause. Logic requires it.

Some might conclude that Matter is Mind [1,2], but I’m asserting that Matter is Mind is Cause.

Like you, physicist Lee Smolin asserts that Time is Cause [3,4].

But I think it is very clear from physics’ mathematical representations of law of nature relationships that time is just another variable or a category of information, in the same sense that energy, momentum and relative spatial position are variables or categories of information. All these variables only exist in relationship to other variables, they are not independent entities with the power to cause events.

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1. a) “If your theory of being-a-subject (i.e. consciousness) relies solely on matter, but your theory of matter can't get rid of the subject's being, then you're walking on swampy ground.” Mind, Matter and Materialism by Adam Frank, professor of astronomy at the University of Rochester, New York, 26 March 2017, https://www.npr.org/sections/13.7/2017/03/26/521478684/mind-matter-and-materialism , b) Minding matter by Adam Frank, 13 March 2017, https://aeon.co/essays/materialism-alone-cannot-explain-the-riddle-of-consciousness .

2. I mean information-integrated matter (particles, atoms, molecules and living things), not aggregates of matter (piles of sand, chairs, computers and robots).

3. “Time, in the sense of causation is fundamental, by which is meant that it is irreducible. The activity of time is the unceasing and irreversible generation of novel events from present events; this generates a continually growing network of causal relations.”, Temporal Relationalism, theoretical physicist Lee Smolin, 1 June 2018, https://arxiv.org/abs/1805.12468v1

4. “There is a dynamic process that makes everything, the canvas of it all. We call it Time, but it is THE substance with THE built-in cause”, Marcel-Marie LeBel wrote on Jun. 26, 2018 @ 03:24 GMT

The word “time” has a host of meanings, and if not specified which one we mean, it has none. This is the source of the confusion.

As a measure, time is a relative variable. But time runs whether we measure it or not. The basic spontaneous process that makes everything got its name (time) only when we showed up with our conscious minds.

The word “time” has a host of meanings, and if not specified which one we mean, it has none. This is the source of the confusion.

As a measure, time is a relative variable. But time runs whether we measure it or not. The basic spontaneous process that makes everything got its name (time) only when we showed up with our conscious minds.

I say time is the measure of the local rate of evolution of spontaneous events e.g. nuclear disintegration, sand falling in the hourglass, mechanical relaxation of a quartz crystal... All our time measuring devices rely on observing the rate spontaneous evolution of a system. This rate of evolution is time running. The integration of this rate into “seconds” and “hours” is our own making.

I met Adam at the Harvard Science of time conference (http://sot2016.cfa.harvard.edu/SoT2016/cgi-bin/TXT/Invited/Invited_FrankAdam.txt_N.html ) where I had a poster presentation (http://sot2016.cfa.harvard.edu/SoT2016/cgi-bin/TXT/Poster/Oral_LeBelMarcelMarie.txt_N.html ) . We did discuss and had further correspondence on the subject... I have read his book..

In my FQXI essay, I suggest that the rate of evolution of this time process is the only ontological real independent variable. This is because, a process cannot have two “independent” variables; the process is whole. A gradient in the rate of evolution of this process time is the cause, has stated by Unruh.

‘ .. A more accurate way of summarizing the lessons of General Relativity is

that gravity does not cause time to run differently in different places (e.g., faster far from the earth than near it). Gravity is the unequable flow of time from place to place. It is not that there are two separate phenomena, namely gravity and time and that the one, gravity, affects the other. Rather the theory states that the phenomena we usually ascribe to gravity are actually caused by time’s flowing unequably from place to place... “ arXiv:gr-qc/9312027v2 17 Dec 1993

Since logic requires that a logical system operates under only one internal cause, this cause (rate differential) has to be the one.

Time is not fundamental in the universe: time is merely derived information. The only way to derive time information from change of number information [1] is via an algorithmic step: the universe was doing this primitive algorithmic analysis long before molecules or living things came on the scene.

The universe runs on information it has about itself, including the above time information. More specifically, the universe is not an entity/agent: the only entities/agents are particles, atoms, molecules, and living things. These entities experience information about themselves and their surroundings, including time information, where time information is acquired when these entities perform an algorithmic/logical analysis of number change.

But what is “change”? You seem to assume that “change” requires no explanation; that change is a self-sufficient entity, a primitive of the universe system. But actually, change never just happens; when traced back to its source, change is caused, caused by entities: this is agency.

1. I mean: change of what we human beings would represent as a number. Numbers are not a human conceit; numbers represent an underlying reality: the “quantity” of a variable (category of information); where a category of information might be e.g. energy, momentum, or relative spatial position.

Re “time is the measure of the local rate of evolution of spontaneous events”; “the rate of evolution of this time process is the only ontological real independent variable”:

There are no free-of-cause “spontaneous events” in the universe: quantum jumps (in what we human beings might symbolically represent as the numeric value of a variable) are caused by agents.

Any “rate of evolution” seems to require a pre-existing information delimiter. Quantum jumps are the only information delimiters in the entire universe: there are no other possible delimiters of unit. When traced back, there is only one cause of change of number, and that is quantum jumps (and an edifice of information relationships that are impacted by the addition of a new number relationship being added to the edifice). These quantum jumps are the only moving parts in the entire universe.

Life is information. Life is a retroactively transmitted recipe for spending energy more efficiently than the black body. But before life, there is no information transmitted. It is only the logic of existence, where and how, according to the rate of the time process, the cause.

Every bit of this universe is alone and only feels what is close by. It doesn’t know anything else. It is only ONE; no number greater than one. Any number greater than one is the making of a third party watching and counting; us.

Space, for example, is just considering at the same time points that are not at the same time; they are always away in time from each other. So, forget about space. There is only the time process out there, and it makes everything.

Adam was interested in my poster presentation for the following. All waves we know are travelling variations of the variable of the medium. I presented that EM waves are travelling variations in the rate of the time process, the medium. It contains the cause for motion, which is the same for all types of waves to move; a time rate differential.

Electricity and magnetism are intertwined with time. But they are too many entities for a logical system to work. From a substantial based model, we find that an electric line is the rate of the time process changing direction, from increasing to decreasing or vice versa. The magnetic field is the rate of the time process changing, increasing or decreasing. All of it fits neatly with the laws of induction. The old EM models were banking on an empty vacuum. We now know the vacuum is anything but empty ....

Only one cause in the universe. The magnets sticking to your fridge? Just a time rate differential causing a higher probability of existence between the fridge and magnet. The force is equal, but the magnet is smaller so it is the one that gets to move.

Both those with a victim mentality, and perpetrators of criminal acts, will find comfort in the FQXi website, because it consists almost entirely of contributions from people who believe that they have 0% agency.

“It was 100% the laws of nature (or 100% the action of time) wot done it, your honour, I have 0% agency to resist committing these acts” says the perpetrator of criminal acts; “It was the 100% the laws of nature (or 100% the action of time) wot done it, your honour, I have 0% agency to resist being a victim of these acts” says the victim.

The point is that agency necessarily exists at the same level as laws of nature, otherwise it has no power at all to genuinely change physical outcomes.

As I said, "The point is that agency necessarily exists at the same level as laws of nature, otherwise it has no power at all to genuinely change physical outcomes". "Free will" that does not genuinely create new physical outcomes is nothing but a billiard ball with lipstick on, wearing a suit: such so-called "free will" is nothing but a fancy rebranding of the deterministic outcomes that would be expected from deterministic laws of nature.

But a power that "exists at the same level as laws of nature" to "to genuinely change physical outcomes" is not something that can evolve: this agency is a fundamental aspect of reality.

3- What do you mean by “this agency is a fundamental aspect of reality.” This universe is colorless, dark, tasteless, without space etc. WE make it all up, our reality. Is that what you mean? Are you in any way heading for a GOD discussion? Because if you are, you sure are dragging your feet on this one...

Free will: “The power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate” [1].

Human beings and living things (and indeed, fundamental particles) are mostly constrained by necessity and fate. Their physical outcomes (e.g. for their vocal chords, their hands and limbs) are constrained by deterministic laws of nature (necessity) interacting with information from their internal and external environment (fate).

Quantum events are the only occasions in which aspects of physical outcomes, in living things and fundamental particles, are unpredictable from the point of view of an observer. Quantum events are the only occasions in which living things and fundamental particles might have the opportunity of “acting without the constraint of necessity or fate”, i.e. of being free agents. Agency would, of course, also depend on the nature of living things and fundamental particles: they would have to have the inherent power to produce these “non-lawful” physical outcomes, that are unpredictable from the point of view of an observer.

If you assert that agency/free will exists, you’ve got 2 equally powerful ways of producing physical outcomes (given an external environment): 1) laws of nature ; 2) agency/free will. The power of agency is necessarily a power equal in strength to the laws of nature, because they both produce physical outcomes. The power to produce physical outcomes is not something that can evolve: both laws of nature and agency are fundamental aspects of reality.

1. https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/free_will ; Power: “The ability or capacity to do something or act in a particular way” https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/power .

The randomness of quantum mechanics is where free will may be applied/ expressed. This means

a) We may express our freedom by manipulating quantum phenomena?

b) the seat of free will in our brains is based on a quantum mechanical principle?

Point 2

“The power to produce physical outcomes is not something that can evolve”

What do you mean by that? Elaborate on some proof, demonstration or at least a line of thinking leading to this conclusion.

( If you make choices during this line of thinking ... the result is an opinion, because I could make different choices and come up with a different conclusion i.e. my own opinion. On the other hand, if you show that I don’t have a choice, no one has any other choice (choiceless) then, it is a truth. A truth is an absence of choice for everyone)

This thread is based on two things. 1) you making original statements at the beginning and 2) me trying to get explanations about how you got to these statements so that I could understand by myself.

Every time I explain my own ideas, I understand them a bit better myself and I learn to formulate them in a more accessible way. I was hoping you would take this opportunity to do just that for yourself. The process obviously failed and I do accept some responsibility in this.

This is not the first time, and not even the second time, that you have made arrogant and presumptuous remarks: "I was hoping you would take this opportunity to do just that for yourself. The process obviously failed and I do accept some responsibility in this."

As I suspected, you unthinkingly say you believe in "free will", but you seem to have no idea what you actually mean by "free will", especially a "free will"/"agency" that might be compatible with the physics of the universe.

What philosopher Daniel Dennett calls “free will” is an extremely feeble thing. His so called “free will” is a mere rebranding of the deterministic outcomes that would be expected from deterministic laws of nature. A person possessing his version of “free will” is logically equivalent to a billiard ball or a dry leaf blowing in the wind. This person is not an agent, any more than a...

What philosopher Daniel Dennett calls “free will” is an extremely feeble thing. His so called “free will” is a mere rebranding of the deterministic outcomes that would be expected from deterministic laws of nature. A person possessing his version of “free will” is logically equivalent to a billiard ball or a dry leaf blowing in the wind. This person is not an agent, any more than a billiard ball or a dry leaf is an agent.

Genuine free will [1] determines physical outcomes in the universe in exactly the same way that laws of nature determine physical outcomes. There are two types of determinants of physical outcomes in the universe: agents with free will powers, and laws of nature.

In quantum events [2], agents exert power over some of their own physical parameters and spatial configurations. A genuine agent modifies itself in relationship to its environment, thereby causing modification to its environment, and even potentially the rest of the world. This agency, this quantum, non-law-of-nature, self-modification of (e.g.) spatial configuration information seems to be what is observed in particles, atoms, molecules, and living things.

In the same way that laws of nature are not energy [3], the power of an agent to determine outcomes is not energy. In the same way that laws of nature determine (what we would represent as) numerical outcomes for variables like energy, the power of an agent is to determine (what we would represent as) numerical outcomes for variables like energy.

1. Free will: “The power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate”, https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/free_will . Power: “The ability or capacity to do something or act in a particular way”, https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/power .

Here's an idea Lorraine. Considering a coin toss: It might be argued that the singular fixed outcome is decided by the deterministic physics of the universe as the coin moves prior to being caught. There can be only one outcome heads or tails. Yet, a counter argument is that the observer has a choice of method used for ascertaining the outcome. Coin as caught in palm, revealed by opening the fingers or coin as seen on back of opposite hand when the hand that placed it there is removed. The two outcomes are opposites. So is it just a determined process, up until reveal, that is determining the limited fixed state or is it the observer by choosing how the reveal is performed? Perhaps the coin toss outcome is deciding some very different courses of action of the observer. The change that happens when a different way of looking at the coin is chosen is not altering the evolution of the state of the coin that has 'evolved' prior to looking but forming a different relation with the coin.

I would say that almost every movement of a living thing is due to agency. But the form of a living thing is pretty much fixed e.g. a human being is not free to rearrange all his atoms, and transform into a big bird and fly away. But we never seem to notice the multitudinous ways in which we are not free, compared to the few ways in which we are free.

You describe an interaction between a free agent and a non-free coin. The agent will be informed by high-level summary information about her environment (derived from analysis of masses of lower-level information coming from her particles, atoms, molecules, cells and organs); the coin won’t have any information at all; but the atoms/molecules in the coin will have low-level information about their environment. I would say that agents experience information relationships.

The physical outcomes of the coin will be fully determined by the situation (including interaction with the agent) and by laws of nature. But the physical outcomes of the agent will be partly determined by the agent herself: this is creativity/free will/agency. I would say that agents partly determine their own physical outcomes by creating new information relationships.

Even after the coin is caught the singular outcome that will be observed is undetermined, until the choice of how to observe the outcome is decided and actualized. (If the observer has free will to decide). The observer then sees the singular outcome resulting from the choice that was made and carried out. EM radiation is reflected only from the exposed coin surface, so the manifestation generated by the observer only depicts that singular surface, No information is obtainable from the concealed side. Consideration has gone from the two sided, two possibility object to the singular sided manifestation generated by the observer,

I don't understand the point you seem to be trying to make. You seem to be equating the word "undetermined" [1] with the term "free will" [2]: they are not the same thing.

Also you seem to think that there is some significance in: "No information is obtainable from the concealed side".

Sometimes I agree with some of what physicist Sabine Hossenfelder has to say: "there are a lot of people who want you to accept watered-down versions of free will, eg that you have free will because no one can in practice predict your behavior, or because no one can tell what’s going on in your brain, and so on. But I think this is just verbal gymnastics." [3]

Whatever evolution of the orientation of the coin has happened, the outcome state is undetermined because it depends on actualization of a particular method of observation. The outcome can be either until the choice is enacted. After, the outcome perceived is truly singular because the image generated used input that only came from the exposed side of the coin. It seems to me rather like quantum experiments in which choice of how to observe is limiting what can be found. If X orientation of the apparatus is chosen the result for Y and Z orientations can't be known. They (the other results) don't exist as there has not been interaction with the apparatus that leads to their generation. I said if the observer has freewill to decide because it is not certain. It may be that the evolution of the universe is such that the choice chosen is inevitable and the observer only thinks it was made freely. I also thought it was a bit like your something new being formed. The perceived outcome being categorically different from the test subject.

"In place of a clear vision of little bits of matter that explain all the big things around us, quantum physics gives us a powerful yet seemly paradoxical calculus. With its emphasis on probability waves, essential uncertainties and experimenters disturbing the reality they seek to measure, quantum mechanics made imagining the stuff of the world as classical bits of matter (or miniature billiard balls) all but impossible. . .Putting the perceiving subject back into physics would seem to undermine the whole materialist perspective. A theory of mind that depends on matter that depends on mind could not yield the solid ground so many materialists yearn for",

Adam Frank, professor of astronomy at the University of Rochester in New York, 13 March 2017, https://aeon.co/essays/materialism-alone-cannot-explain-the-riddle-of-consciousness

The 'Properties' of matter are often assumed inherent and solely 'owned' by the object having that property. Yet they are relative to how they are observed and for a macroscopic object the property can have different values or states for different observers of it. Not so for the tiny quantum object because measurements disturbance is significant in magnitude, so the value or state is altered preventing further measurements of what it was. As 'Properties' of matter have been assumed inherent and solely 'owned' by the object having that property this is at odds with objects having both contradictory states. Which is observed depending on the observation method or perspective choice. Without saying how it is to be looked at and looking that way there isn't a singular fixed state or value as the context is needed to define it. Not thinking of 'billiard balls' with definite singular values and states but that the measurable variables are only attributes belonging to a particular relation with the observed.

It is not the case that: “for the tiny quantum object … measurements disturbance is significant in magnitude, so the value or state is altered preventing further measurements of what it was.”

It is not the case that: “objects hav[e] both contradictory states.”

It is not the case that: “Which [of the abovementioned “contradictory states”] is observed depend[s] on the observation method or perspective choice”

It is not the case that: “measurable variables are only attributes belonging to a particular relation with the observed”. Relationships (representable as mathematical equations) are between categories of information (like momentum or relative spatial position), not between observer and observed.

Direct interaction with the object measured will affect it. But the measurement is scale appropriate so for a macroscopic object the tiny alteration of the measurable is lost with the scale appropriate truncation of the value. It is insignificant. Not so for a very tiny object. Another method is measurements of macroscopic objects that are actually of the image generated by the observer and not the object itself, so there is no direct interaction.

Objects can 'have' both contradictory states as which state it is deemed to be in depends upon the relationship with it that is under consideration. The 'having' of the object is perhaps misleading/ambiguous; seeming to be to do with the conventional idea of properties belonging to the object, whereas it ought to be 'having' to do with relations with the object. If the deciding relation is not yet chosen there are both or all singular fixed outcome possibilities, not yet actualities as singular fixed state or value. E.g. The 'spin' of the quantum object depends on how it is measured as exposure to the field generates the outcome, unless already of a field appropriate orientation. The clockwise or anticlockwise spin of a globe depends on the position of the observer relative to it.

I did not say the relation had to be between observer and observed but “measurable variables are only attributes belonging to a particular relation with the observed”. That is relative to something else than just the object itself. Such as the orientation of a magnetic field, or relative to things in the environment such as bicycle or a jet plane (generating two different velocity values for the same observed 'object'.

But essentially, you are saying that 100 years of physics’ quantum experiments got it wrong. Essentially, you are saying that the experimental physicists failed to notice “scale appropriate truncation of the value” and “how [“the quantum object”] is measured” and “the position of the observer relative to” “the quantum object”. Essentially, you are saying that quantum outcomes are 100% explainable by “scale appropriate truncation of the value” and “how [“the quantum object”] is measured” and “the position of the observer relative to” “the quantum object”. Essentially, you are saying that for 100 years, physicists have been incapable of thinking out, setting up, and conducting experiments.

Lorraine, re. your "There is no such thing as “Objects [having] contradictory states”." I beg to differ. If a spinning globe is seen to be rotating clockwise by an observer looking at the North pole it will be seen spinning anticlockwise by an observer looking at the South pole. Therefore two opposite states can be given for the rotation of the globe. Only by limiting the observation to one viewpoint out of those two does the object acquire a singular state that is attributed to it.

Once again you have extrapolated what I have actually said into opinions that I have not expressed or intended. To me, I'm making sense of the idea of superposition of states, and why quantum measurements are seemingly affected more by the process of measurement than macroscopic measurements, and how different 'spin' states happen fitting experimental results.

seemingly spin is more like a category of information about a particle; it was inferred in order to make sense of experiments and to explain the behaviour of electrons; spin is not really about an object spinning in space.

Lorraine, spin up or down is the response of the particle to the magnetic field it is exposed to, producing one or the other outcome. My globe example was given in response to your "There is no such thing as “Objects [having] contradictory states”." The spinning globe is nice because it is easily visualized. There is one behaviour but two different state descriptions pertaining to the different relations with the object. I could have continued with the coin example. The coin has two 'flat' sides, heads and tails. When one side only is observed, the seen state is attributed to the (materially still two sided) coin. I addressed spin when I wrote about X, Y, and Z orientations of the magnetic field [of a Stern Gerlach apparatus]. Prior to exposure to the field responses to all orientations of the field are possible but after exposure there is only the response to the actual field 'experienced' by the particle. The decision of how to look affects what can be found.

Re “spin up or down is the response of the particle to the magnetic field it is exposed to, producing one or the other outcome”; “If a spinning globe is seen to be rotating clockwise by an observer . . .To me, I'm making sense of the idea of superposition of states, and why quantum measurements are seemingly affected more by the process of measurement than macroscopic measurements, and how different 'spin' states happen fitting experimental results”:

Spin is more complicated that you seem to realise. Spin is not comparable to what happens with a spinning globe.

Re “The spinning globe is nice because it is easily visualized. There is one behaviour but two different state descriptions pertaining to the different relations with the object”:

A quantum event can have multiple possible outcomes for the next moment in time: these multiple possibilities are irrespective of the viewpoint of observers.

No matter what you do to it, a rotating globe can have only one possible outcome for every next moment in time: this single possible outcome is also irrespective of the viewpoint of observers.

When the actual outcome occurs, observers might have different subjective views about whether the globe is rotating clockwise or anti-clockwise. These different subjective viewpoints are due to the observer’s position relative to the globe.

Multiple subjective views of single possible outcomes are an entirely different thing to the multiple possible outcomes that quantum events can have.

Lorraine, I am not comparing a spinning globe to quantum spin. I tried to explain that they are different. The similarity is that choice of 'how to look/measure' affects what can be found. The spinning globe has a singular spinning behaviour that is not changed by observation. How it is observed affects the state description outcome. The behaviour that leads to quantum spin outcomes when measured is less fixed. The behaviour is either appropriate for the field orientation used or it isn't. Only if it isn't does it change to be appropriate. This fits experimental results. Retest of same field orientation gives same result, making it seem the spin is a fixed property. But different field orientation gives 50/50 up /down results as if not previously tested and aligned with a field. The change allows appropriate response to all challenges without having to, in some way, carry all of the the possible responses prior to the test. Which an electron does not have the capacity to do. There are "multiple possible outcomes" prior to testing, as the individual particles behaviour, leading to an outcome, depends on the test environment chosen.

Erwin Schrodinger ¨ in his popular book “Mind and matter” (1958), wrote:

''The material world has only been constructed at the price of taking the

self, that is, mind, out of it, removing it; mind is not part of it. . .''

We could replace the word ''mind'' by consciousness, agency and the quote still works. Science is limited by its methodology and language and although scientific theories are about describing invariant aspects of the world, they do not described the world as it is . The material world is a scientific conception. It is not simply ''reality'' or ''the world''. It is a scientific narrative. In it, there is no such things as ''mind'', ''consciousness'' , ''agency'', ''experience'' that are central to all our life. The lack of it, the non appearance of these reality is a methodical requirement of the scientific approach itself. We knows that these are the most central realities for living being like us and sometime wonder what they are in terms of our scientific conceptions of the world we have already established. We forget that this scientific conceptual world is contrainted by the scientific method and its own mode of conceptualisation that has to be objective. The observer can't be in it. It is a impersonal narrative mode. TRying to re-introduce what is a priori banished in this conceptual narrative mode is not going to work. These central realities allows us to create these scientific narratives but we can't find them. The first scientific materialistic cosmologies have been done in the Ionian Enlightenmen by removing the carriers of agency, the gods from the old cosmogonies. We won't create gods from the stuff of the cosmologies.

No one in their right mind would say that a universe, where all outcomes are 100% determined by laws of nature, could support free will/agency.

And no one in their right mind would say that a universe, where a portion of these outcomes are caused by “Atoms randomly decay[ing]”, could support free will/agency [1].

The only type of universe which can support free will/agency is a universe in which the abovementioned atoms cause the outcomes, outcomes which appear random from the point of view of an observer.

Re measuring agency [2]: Laws of nature are a genuine cause of outcomes, but laws of nature can’t be measured – they can only be inferred from measurements. Similarly, an agency that is a genuine cause of outcomes can’t be measured – it can only be inferred from measurements.

1. “Atoms randomly decay and no one would call that free will. (Well, no one in their right mind anyway, but I’ll postpone my rant about panpsychic pseudoscience to some other time.)”, physicist Sabine Hossenfelder, http://backreaction.blogspot.com/2018/07/limits-of-reductionism.html

2. “We envision the APW program will lead researchers to question how we define, identify, and measure agency, intelligence, and consciousness, and to investigate how these concepts fit into our current physical theories”, FQXi Administrator Brendan Foster wrote on Oct. 28, 2017 @ 13:40 GMT, https://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/2941

I think we can assume that the laws of nature, that physicists have come up with, represents something true about the nature of reality.

Physicists have ascertained that most laws of nature should not be represented as simple mathematical relationships, e.g. E2 = (pc)2 + (mc2)2, or E = mc2 would be examples of simple mathematical relationships. Instead, laws of nature might be represented as (what I would call) semi-algorithmic relationships: semi-algorithmic because the delta symbol represents an algorithmic step. I take this to be a somewhat accurate representation of what is actually going on at a fundamental level. I mean that semi-algorithmic relationships seem to indicate that somehow, more sophisticated information processing than you might expect, is going on at a fundamental level in the universe.

This leads to the question of the difference between particles, atoms and molecules on the one hand, and living things on the other hand. I would say that the main difference is in the complexity of the algorithmic relationships that analyse fundamental categories of information, and also, the ability to analyse quantities of information. Seemingly these new, more complex algorithmic information relationships define, or even create, living things.

This in turn leads to the question of where these algorithmic relationships came from: algorithmic relationships cannot emerge from deterministic processes. Algorithmic relationships are new relationships, necessarily created by matter i.e. by agents.

A “law of nature” relationship like E = mc2 represents a relationship between categories of information.

But a representation of a “law of nature” relationship which contains the delta symbol represents not only a relationship between categories of information, but an extra level of information: number change.

This is what algorithms do: they extract extra levels of information out of existing “lower level” information. And necessarily, this is how we must represent what living things do: they extract extra levels of information by algorithmically analysing and collating masses of existing “lower level” information. And number change is a very fundamental type of “higher level” information.

Algorithmic relationships cannot emerge from deterministic processes, or from deterministic plus random processes. Algorithmic relationships are an extra level of information added to a system, because algorithmic relationships produce an extra level of information in a system.

But computers process symbolic representations of information: neither the computer, nor any part of a computer, ever has any idea what any of the symbols represent. When oh when is it going to get through the thick heads of people, like Nick Bostrom and his idiot followers, that computers/robots are as clueless as billiard balls.

Physicist and astronomer Adam Frank notes that: “our best theory for how matter behaves still tells us very little about what matter is” [1].

But the implication of free will [2] is that matter’s parameters [3] are not only determined by laws of nature, but that matter itself has the power to determine its own parameter numbers. Presumably, this power only applies to certain configurations of matter: agents, but not piles of sand, chairs or billiard balls.

I would say that the free will/agency debate is about the inherent nature of matter.

1. “There is, however, a significant weakness hiding in the imposing-looking materialist redoubt. . . after more than a century of profound explorations into the subatomic world, our best theory for how matter behaves still tells us very little about what matter is. Materialists appeal to physics to explain the mind, but in modern physics the particles that make up a brain remain, in many ways, as mysterious as consciousness itself.”, Adam Frank, professor of astronomy at the University of Rochester in New York, 13 March 2017, https://aeon.co/essays/materialism-alone-cannot-explain-the-riddle-of-consciousness

2. Free will: "The power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate", https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/free_will

3. Parameter: “(technical) A numerical or other measurable factor forming one of a set that defines a system or sets the conditions of its operation”, https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/parameter

You’ve got “How it is observed” in one sentence, and “The behaviour that leads to . . . outcomes” in the next sentence. From sentence to sentence, you jump all over the place, mixing up the situations, behaviours and timelines of observers with the situations, behaviours and timelines of particles, lumping them all together in the one discussion, making a total mess of it. You need to completely separate out the individual timelines, behaviours and situations of all the different entities that are part of the situation being examined.

And remember, this page is about “Agency in the Physical World”: you are in effect trying to imply that different outcome numbers are merely due to different points of view, or randomness (“less fixed”). You are in effect trying to imply that different outcome numbers due to agency/free will don’t exist, i.e. you are trying to imply that genuine agency/free will doesn’t exist.

Come on Georgina, out with it, be honest. Your faux “free will” means that human beings have the same “free will” as billiard balls or spinning globes of the world.

Lorraine, to get an outcome from the Stern Gerlach apparatus the particle has to be exposed to the environment within the apparatus, which is a magnetic field with a particular orientation. The way that the particle responds to the field is important. It either already has a suitable orientation of behaviour or it doesn't. Can stay with its orientation of behaviour to the field, to give up or down spin result or it must change so that it is aligned with the field and can give up or down spin result. Both the experiment's environment and the behaviour of the particle are needed to get the result. I'm sorry you think that my discussion has lacked the clarity needed. Re.your "you are in effect trying to imply that different outcome numbers are merely due to different points of view, or randomness (“less fixed”). I don't think the outcomes of the Stern Gerlach apparatus are entirely random but as I described. The particle responds to the field but the human being chooses the field orientation. The numerical value attributed to a variable or the state of a variable does depend on how the 'measurement' is made; the relation established with the object under consideration or relation with it that is being considered.

For the purposes of this discussion, we can discount laws of nature and the environment as causative factors, because these factors are common to every outcome that has ever occurred: most (but maybe not all) of the outcome numbers have been mandated by laws of nature and the environment encountered. I want to focus on the outcome numbers that are not mandated by laws of nature and the environment (if any).

Re “the particle . . .Can stay with its orientation of behaviour to the field . . . or it must change”; “Both the experiment's environment and the behaviour of the particle are needed to get the result”:

So how can the particle be said to “change”/ “behave”, if we discount outcome numbers that are mandated by laws of nature and the environment?

In your previous reply you gave your answer: “The behaviour that leads to quantum spin outcomes when measured is less fixed”, and you now say that “The particle responds to the field but the human being chooses the field orientation”. So, we can discount the particle’s behaviour/response because you seem to be saying that the particle’s outcome numbers are 100% ruled by laws of nature and the environment (“The particle responds to the field”). What is left is your claim that it is the human being’s choice that mandates any other outcome numbers.

This leads to the question of whether your human being really does have a choice/agency over outcome numbers, or whether your human being’s choice/agency is itself just an outcome that is fully mandated by laws of nature and the environment. Without a “mechanism” that allows choice/agency to determine the fundamental numbers, just like laws of nature determine the fundamental numbers, there is merely a surface appearance of choice/agency in your human being.

With your view of the cosmos, genuine choice/“free will”/agency over the numbers can’t exist because you have no “mechanism” whereby it could occur.

You ask "So how can the particle be said to “change”/ “behave”, if we discount outcome numbers that are mandated by laws of nature and the environment?" The particle isn't carrying all of the responses it must make for the different challenges it might face but responds, as it is to what it encounters. The only necessity is that from its starting condition it behaves according to its nature as a negatively charged particle in a magnetic field. The 'outcome numbers', in the example I am using resultant spin states, are not already in existence prior to the particles experiencing the field. For there to be agency of any kind the material future can not already exist. For free will there also has to be the possibility of real choice affecting what happens, rather than just the appearance of choice. Evidence in favour of there being real choice is the evolution of brains able to problem solve and decide; providing a survival advantage.

Rather than each decision fracturing the universe into different alternative realities, the choice is eliminating some possibilities and retaining others. Some of which will be actualized. The material future is unwritten but the possibilities can be imagined. As an analogy the imagined future could be likened to a book containing choices for the reader to make which lead to different outcomes. Each choice produces a different story even though the majority of the book's tale happens without reader choice being involved. The written words are like the inevitable outcomes, there is no choice involved. However, the decision places, that affect the route through the book, are where free will is possible and the "steering of the future" is possible.(But not inevitable because of the complexity involved.) Outcomes of decisions are not always as expected or hoped for.

Re "the choice is eliminating some possibilities and retaining others":

There is nothing in physics that allows a person to eliminate possible outcome numbers or choose outcome numbers (e.g. numbers representing relative spatial position) from a range of possible numbers. Are you thinking of "random choice", which if it exists, just happens (no person is involved)?

There are absolutely no "choices", "decision places", or "steering of the future" implied by the equations of physics, and there is certainly no way a human being could evolve this agency/superpower over (what we would represent as) the outcome numbers. If it exists, this superpower cannot evolve - it can only be inherent in matter.

Lorraine, Re. elimination of possibilities: The observer has a choice of how to look at the caught coin. While he has no choice of the orientation of the coin object caught in his hand. Each choice provides a different state. Lets say his holiday destination depends upon the outcome. Two different destinations with different itinerary. Heads = Finland, tails = Malta. The method used to identify the state provides one destination with all its possibilities and eliminates the other destination and all of its possibilities. The coin example shows how possibilities can be eliminated but admittedly it isn't preference of state being selected. You are not taking into account emergence of forms and function from higher levels of complexity than just ground floor physics. Setting up an 'if then' scenario is a kind of steering.While there may be no control over the 'if', there is control of what the 'then' consequence would be. The 'if' happening leads to actualizing of the the 'then' consequence and eliminates other incompatible, previously possible consequences.

And as I said, there is no emergence from deterministic systems: the “science” of chaos/ complexity/ emergence is a bit of a joke.

You have to add (the equivalent of) algorithms to the universe, to get form and function. And therefore, you have to explain where the algorithms came from, because they certainly didn’t emerge from the deterministic universe that arises from the laws of nature.

I don't think it is word games. To understand how complex systems work their complexity has to be taken into account not just the behaviour of the most basic elements. The form of a bird's egg cannot be explained by the interactions of atoms, ions or sub atomic particles but requires the functioning reproductive tract of a female bird. The function of a brain can not be wholly explained by the behaviour of atoms, ions and sub atomic particles but macroscopic structure has a huge role. A brain is not limited to considering what is currently happening internally and externally to the body but is able to imagine past events and possible future events. It can visualize and produce internal dialogue whereby possibilities, and relevance of stored memory to possible outcomes, can be considered. The brain can instruct the body so that it works towards actualizing the best, or the most easily attainable beneficial, imagined outcome rather than just responding automatically to events as they happen. Although there is also a lot of that going on.

The bird and brain you describe do not illustrate, and are not evidence of, emergence from complexity.

In fact, there is no proof of concept of emergence from complexity:

Nothing emerges out of models of complexity. Other factors are certainly needed: for instance, matter is likely not numb and dumb. Nothing self-organises out of models of complexity; organising principles do not emerge from a model system. On the contrary, organising principles (algorithms) must be added to a model system.

Stephen Wolfram's cellular automata show that simple reiterative processes can lead to complexity. Complex rules or complex instructions are not required. Though his automata work with algorithms, natural inorganic systems function in a way describable by algorithms but not controlled by algorithms that are separate from the natural processes occurring as they must. The simple process of wind or water moving over sand again and again can produce intricate patterns. The sand does not require an algorithm to take the form of the pattern. Yet an algorithm might be written that produces a similar pattern in a model system. I think its important not to muddle a model of a system with the natural, actualized, functioning system. A written description of what the sand particles must do in response to the action of the water or wind is not how the natural process is being controlled, i.e. by the written instructions.Rather it is by the interaction of the participants in the process as they are when the interactions occur.

Having looked up some definitions of "algorithm" I see how DNA and mRNA might be considered as algorithms. Providing step by step instructions for how a process is to be followed. (Transcription into mRNA and transcription into protein structure.) It seems a stretch too far to consider all structures as being algorithms for what must happen step by step. Like saying the surface of a crystal provides the algorithm for building of the next layer. It is providing a kind of template but not step by step instructions. Living in a computer age there is perhaps the priming of minds to seek a computer like model of the universe just as in previous eras the machine or clockwork universe had appeal.Though it can't be ruled out that not only do we generate our own experience of reality, perhaps the source of the input signals is itself not ground floor reality. In which case it might have computer game like 'plug in physics'.

Human beings can graphically represent algorithmic relationships and mathematical relationships, and end up with straight lines, curves, shapes, cellular automata patterns and strange attractors etc. But these representations don’t represent any sort of emergence, they only represent the algorithmic relationships and the mathematical relationships.

The characteristic of living things, from the most primitive onwards, is that they require and utilise higher-level information derived by (the equivalent of) algorithmic analysis of lower-level information. E.g. the information acquired from a living thing interacting with large numbers of photons is not much use until this information has, in effect, been analysed to acquire higher-level information of relevance to the organism e.g. the higher-level information might be: a wolf is running towards you.

But whereas a deer might conclude the equivalent of the higher-level information “a wolf is running towards you”, if the same photons had interacted with a caterpillar, the caterpillar would not be capable of identifying a wolf. I.e. the higher-level information is not inherent in the base-level information.

Algorithmic relationships “sit above” and organise base-level information. These relationships are not caused by base-level information: instead, the relationships are caused/created by agents/ organisms/ living things.

(Computers/robots do not cause their own algorithms. And they only process symbolic representations of information i.e. they don’t know what the symbols mean i.e. they don’t know what information is represented i.e. they are 100% numb and dumb.)

Lorraine, I don't see why the finding of a great attractor in some data or a complex pattern from a cellular automaton isn't finding emergence. The emergent pattern being something greater than the parts, the collection data points or algorithmic instructions. Something concealed, in the unprocessed data or instructions that becomes apparent when processed.

I think the potential to manifest an image given the right conditions is intrinsic to the EM signals that are receivable by living things. A convex lens can focus the light onto a screen, (could also happen with a raindrop and leaf) and the deer image appears without any need for algorithm instructions. To have knowledge and understanding of a seen image does require further processing.

The processing carried out is due to the functioning of the organs involved which can be broken down into simpler processes. the inputs to the processes are not alone enabling the processes. I think we can agree on that at least.

1. What “emerges” from cellular automata algorithms only “emerges” in the same sense that a straight line “emerges” from a graphical plot of the mathematical relationship y=2x . In both cases, the graphical plot is merely another way of representing the algorithm or mathematical relationship.

2. Re “the potential to manifest an image given the right conditions is intrinsic to the EM signals that are receivable by living things”:

Not so. There is no “image” (i.e. higher-level information) until the information from photon interactions is in effect algorithmically analysed. What higher-level information results depends on the individual organism and the type of organism. The “knowledge and understanding” IS the information relationships, including the algorithmic relationships. Information, i.e. knowledge and understanding IS relationship.

1. A line is simple, a line is easily predicted ,and may even be visualizable from the raw data or instructions.. The form of a highly complex pattern is not easily predicted from the raw data or instructions. " Over and over again we will see the same kind of thing: that even though the underlying rules for a system are simple, and even though the system is started from simple initial conditions, the behavior that the system shows can nevertheless be highly complex. " [Wolfram, S., A New Kind of Science, Champaign, IL: Wolfram Media.]... " Due to the local nature of a CA’s operations, it is typically very hard, if not impossible, to understand the CA’s global behavior (…) by directly examining either the bits in the lookup table or the temporal sequence of raw 1–0 spatial configurations of the lattice." [Hordijk, Wim, James P. Crutchfield, and Melanie Mitchell, 1996, “Embedded Particle Computation in Evolved Cellular Automata” Quotes from Berto, Francesco and Tagliabue, Jacopo, "Cellular Automata", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2017 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.)

Nevertheless, the graphical plot is merely a way of pictorially representing the algorithm or mathematical relationship. Despite difficulty in being able to predict a "CA’s global behavior", nothing actually emerges.

2. There are two different kinds of image that can be formed from the EM radiation. 1.The actualized image in the material reality external to any observer. It is the consequence of the focusing of the 'light' onto a screen of some kind. It could be a light sensitive emulsion or just a material that is temporarily affected by the intensity and frequencies of the EM hitting it .Is it there when it isn't seen? Yes in the same way the Moon is there when not seen. It does not require an observer to happen, but is an observation independent phenomenon. Yes the 'light' reflected from the screen can subsequently be received by an observer who identifies the image but that is not necessary for the potential image to have occurred externally.2.Light can be received directly by a sighted organism or device such as a camera and the image is formed internally.The observing organism or device is necessary in this case. Knowledge of the image formed by the camera is not necessary for the image to exist. Likewise not all images formed on the retina of an eye necessarily reach conscious awareness. Additional processing of inputs can lead to knowledge and understanding of an external source of the inputs, then they are experienced as existing by the observer/i].

Complexity can emerge from simple processes. The complex neuronal structure of the brain is fractal like. What the brain can do is greater than the sum of the function of individual particles, and neurons it contains. As I said - A brain is not limited to considering what is currently happening internally and externally to the body but is able to imagine past events and possible future events. It can visualize and produce internal dialogue whereby possibilities, and relevance of stored memory to possible outcomes, can be considered. The brain can instruct the body so that it works towards actualizing the best, or the most easily attainable beneficial, imagined outcome rather than just responding automatically to events as they happen.

Re “Is [the “actualized image in the material reality”] there when it isn't seen? Yes in the same way the Moon is there when not seen”:

Obviously, things exist. But you seem to be saying that independent of things, fully-fledged images of these things exist, floating around in space, and having a type of platonic existence. I hope you are not saying that, because that would be absurd.

Re the brain:

The brain you describe does not illustrate emergence from complexity; the brain you describe is not evidence of emergence from complexity. There is no proof of concept that anything at all, e.g. brains, emerge/self-organise out of complexity.

Lorraine, a real image (source of seen 'real' image) is a real phenomenon actualized in external reality, unlike a virtual image, that only has the manifest appearance of being at a place in space external to the mind. That the source of the seen real image is out there where it appears to be can be shown by putting a light sensitive material at that position and obtaining a negative image due to the light exposure. The real image (source of seen 'real' image external to the mind) provides an EM signal as if it is the material object source of the seen image; As the focused light hitting the screen is re-emitted and then received by the observer. I think this is very basic physics. Nothing to do with platonic ideas. Once the EM radiation has been emitted from an object it is separate from it even though focusing the EM can produce an image with the semblance of the object. The EM radiation has to be focused to produce an image and so it isn't, for the most part, images traveling through space but there is potential for them to be formed.

Your "EM radiation", i.e. individual photons, do not exist as a potential "image" i.e. potential higher-level information. What exists is individual photons that individually interact with e.g. a camera or a living thing.

Any "image" that living things experience is due to the equivalent of algorithmic analysis of individual pieces of information acquired from individual photon interactions with parts of their eyes. This is true whether the living thing is looking at a country scene or a photo of the country scene: the image is acquired from the analysis. The “image” on a photo is a whole lot of dots that only acquires a coherence via this algorithmic analysis.

P.S. There is no "EM signal", no message being sent out to the rest of the world. A signal is "A gesture, action, or sound that is used to convey information or instructions, typically by prearrangement between the parties concerned; An electrical impulse or radio wave transmitted or received; An apparatus on a railway, typically a coloured light or a semaphore, giving indications to train drivers of whether or not the line is clear." https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/signal .

There is an issue of inadequate vocabulary to differentiate object sources and seen 'objects', both of which are in general parlance refereed to by the same object name. Eg. the image of a cat being called 'a cat' and the source object also being called 'a cat'. I use actualization (source) and manifestation (seen semblance) to help differentiate them. The same inadequacy applies to the source of a seen real image; not formed from EM signals coming directly from an object source but from light focused onto some kind of material screen or substance such as water vapour. As the term image is used to describe what is seen it isn't particularly helpful to also have the source of the image also called image. Being consistent with the means of differentiating sources and what is seen I have referred to the seen real image's source as being actualized. Therefore the image that is seen is a manifestation of the actualized image generated by the observer.

Yes, I agree the individual photons alone do not have the potential to be focused into an image but the cascade of photons traveling as light waves can, and since they can the potential for such to happen must apply to the collection. I'm calling it a signal to differentiate the carrying form from information that can be obtained from it by processing. I do also reefer to EM radiation from a source as 'potential sensory information'. I have been criticized by another for just calling it information, which lacks sufficient accuracy.

I agree that what is seen is obtained by processing but not that it is only analyzed at the level of individual photons. Re. sight: The outputs of the photoreceptor cells are amalgamated into channels of information sent by the optic nerves to the brain. Colour channels; blueness/yellowness, redness/greenness and black /white (shade or brightness) channel. The signals received by the brain are then analyzed, such as by emphasis of boundaries.

2) Representations of Objects. Objects or parts of objects which are representations of other objects (e.g. photos or painted pictures, or a book containing photos or painted pictures).

3A) Symbolic Representations of Objects. Objects or parts of objects which are symbolic representations of other objects (e.g. written or spoken words like “book”, “photo” and “cat”).

3B) Symbolic Re-representations of Symbolic Representations of Objects. Objects or parts of objects which are symbolic re-representations of these already existing symbolic representations (these are used in computers, for example).

Subjects experience the above objects and parts of objects in the following way: Lower-level sensory information (sight, sound, smell) originating from the objects is analysed by the subject, resulting in the subjective experience of higher-level information.

(Clearly, 3A) should also include objects or parts of objects which are symbolic representations of subjective experience (e.g. written or spoken words, and emojis, representing emotions, feelings and ideas)).

Separating the object from the subjective experience of the object: From the point of view of a subject, it can be difficult to separate the object from the subjective experience of the object. E.g. my subjective experience of the computer keyboard in front of me seems to somehow be the keyboard, though obviously me and my subjective experience are separate to the keyboard. But this is the deep structure of reality: subjective experience of information is the only way we know the world.

What is information?

It’s not difficult to see that information can never be a stand-alone fact. Any new information cannot be information unless it is related to existing information; and the existing information cannot be information unless it is related to pre-existing information - all the way down to the most fundamental-level energy and momentum information. Information IS relationship: law of nature relationships; number assignment relationships; algorithmic relationships.

The word "information" has many different meanings. What meaning is used depends upon the area of application of the word; different areas of science and of physics, computer technology, telecommunications, business etc. I think rather than just saying "information is...." it would be helpful to explain the precise way the word is being applied to separate your usage of the word from other incompatible meanings of it. Or to be clear by saying " this is how I will be using the word."

You wrote" It’s not difficult to see that information can never be a stand-alone fact. Any new information cannot be information unless it is related to existing information;.." Nothing in the universe is a stand alone fact, it has in some way come to be. But it might be regarded as a stand alone fact, such as the coin toss outcome state that (though it has come from the evolving coin orientation) appears as new knowledge coming from a state of not knowing. That is if knowledge only is being considered. Taking the known state as collapse of a superposition of states external to the mind it might seem that external reality is changing to fit what is known. Whereas establishment of how the outcome will be identified after the test has happened seals the fate of the outcome prior to the result acquisition, barring exceptional circumstances that prevent the test happening or the result collection as decided.

No it doesn’t. In every case, new information is just new relationships created between existing information categories. I.e. information is never stand-alone, self-sufficient, without context or without basis.

As more or less explained in my previous post, binary digits and words are not information: they are one or more steps removed from being direct subjective information; they are special symbolic codes that represent subjective information. Binary digits and words can only represent information from the point of view of those who know the code. Those (including some physicists!!) who fail to note the distinction and use the term “information” for binary digits, end up with voodoo beliefs that robots/ computers can experience subjective information.

Re a coin toss outcome “might be regarded as a stand alone fact”:

It isn’t a stand-alone fact: it is new information. A coin toss adds new information to the universe because it is a consequence of free will/agency. The new information is not the coin toss outcome, but the new bodily configurations of the agent with respect to the rest of reality. Using bodily configurations, the agent flips and catches a coin, or decides to start a coin flipping machine. The new bodily configurations (representable as new number assignments to existing spatial configuration parameters), together with laws of nature and the existing environment, determine a coin toss outcome that can be represented as a zero or one.

Lorraine, you wrote: "Re a coin toss outcome “might be regarded as a stand alone fact”:" I was clear when I wrote "Nothing in the universe is a stand alone fact, it has in some way come to be. But it might be regarded as a stand alone fact, such as the coin toss outcome state that (though it has come from the evolving coin orientation) appears as new knowledge coming from a state of not knowing."

Knowledge is a different category from the sequence of events/relations that happen to the participants in the coin toss. Just considering the knowledge category the state has gone from not knowing ( it could be either) to a fixed singular state. Quantum mechanics involves knowing of states, measurables, not happenings to existing 'beables'.I'm not saying that that is how it should be, but how it is.

There is no "state of not knowing", because all new knowledge/ knowing/ information is new relationships formed out of existing knowledge/ knowing/ information.

I think you make the mistake of thinking that subjective experience of information/ knowledge can be separated from what you think is really-truly-genuine-real reality; that subjective experience of information/ knowledge is separate to the really-truly-genuine-real events that are happening in the universe.

The not knowing I'm referring to is not being aware of the outcome state because it has not yet been measured and the result obtained.That can be represented as a superposition of possible outcomes. In a unitemporal (same time everywhere) universe, where passage of time is sequential the not yet known state has to precede the known state. I don't think the knowledge appears from nowhere but accept it is a product of the brain processing the inputs it receives, that can be traced back to an external phenomenon providing sensory input, (as well as memory for comprehension being involved). However one way humans make sense of the world is to categorize different things or phenomena. In that way knowledge can be isolated as a different category to the biological structures and functions that produce it. I think separating observer experience from independent external reality is important for physics. For understanding why there are paradoxes in Relativity and for making sense of Quantum mechanics.

1) The agent (the agent being the person who flips the coin) is not the cause of the new information, because (you maybe think) the agent’s actions are as fully determined as a billiard ball’s “actions”; and

2) Any new information comes from mysterious goings-on in the coin department.

I’m saying that agency is the creation of new information, i.e. new relationship.

As opposed to deterministic mathematical models which can be repeatedly run and verified, real-life number outcomes are either:

1) Determined by the laws of nature (though the number outcomes are not necessarily fully predictable because the situation is complicated); or

2) Not determined by the laws of nature (individual number outcomes are not predictable (I’m saying because an agent has created a new relationship/ new information))

There is no need to complexify the situation. There are only 2 ways that number outcomes can be caused (lawful and not lawful): the fact that you, the observer, mightn’t know what the number outcomes are going to be is totally irrelevant.

Knowledge/the observer is part of what is known as quantum mechanics: it is clear that lower-level knowledge of situations existed before brains ever existed, though higher-level knowledge requires brains.

Paradoxes are likely to occur when, against all reason, one insists on imposing a primitive belief that reality is based on numb/dumb particles, instead of the more logical position that reality is based on observer/agent particles.

Lorraine, I wrote "[...}separating observer experience from independent external reality is important for physics. That doesn't cover it. What is important is separating the consequence of signal receipt and processing, which is some kind of output. Not necessarily experience as the 'observer' could be an inanimate device, material or in a calculation merely abstract not an actual entity.

No, I do not think all of the agents actions are fully determined. I talked about how brains are able to work with imagined future and past (memory) and so make choices that are not mere mechanical inevitability. Not merely responding to the sequence of material -Nows and experienced presents. Imagined future choices are established prior to the choice being physically selected in the -Now. No, I don't think there is anything mysterious going on "in the coin department".The state of the coin appears from the relation of the observer to it at observation. As that limits the sensory information that is received and processed into knowledge, to the singular state seen.

Having selected an imagined future the body can be consciously and or subconsciously controlled to effect the imagined outcome, if it is actualize-able. Carrying out the necessary movements, following the imagined 'pathway', eliminates the other possibilities that might have happened. Not only is there the choice of how to view the coin but other things that could have happened such as deliberately dropping the coin an running away without looking at it, just to demonstrate free will and not compulsion to know the state of the coin. If more than one choice of future is contemplated they are like imaginary pathways or bridges that remain open until one is selected. Rather than many actual worlds forming when choices are made, many 'world' possibilities are eliminated when one way only is chosen. Simple causal stories do not encompass the full complexity of the sequence of each new configuration of the material universe forming. Complexity which has the capacity for leading to many possibilities beyond the one that an impoverished linear sequence might suggest.IMHO.

If you want to equate yourself to “an inanimate device, material or in a calculation merely abstract not an actual entity”, then you go right ahead! Just don’t be surprised if the funny farm come to take you away.

And if you think that they are all out there “signal”-ing you, then the funny farm team might be able to help you with that one too.

. . . . .

If the raw materials of your universe consist of: 1) numb and dumb particles and their products; and 2) laws of nature, then how can your brains “make choices that are not mere mechanical inevitability”? Because there’s nothing in your raw materials that would allow your “agents” to make “choices”. And you can forget “complexity” as an answer, because that is just a furphy [1].

You can assert all you like that “agents” and “choices” exist, and yet you have no rational way of justifying your assertions.

Lorraine, I just wanted to be clear that Relativity does not only apply to sentient experiencing observers. The signals I am referring to are potential sensory information in the external environment. Such as reflected or emitted electromagnetic radiation (input enabling sight) and pressure waves in air (input enabling hearing).

The choices are imaginings of the brain, imagined futures not a part of the material world existing. The future is imagined and then the steps necessary to actualize it rather than other possibilities are enacted. Those actions if successful lead to the imagined outcome; and any other possibilities are eliminated at the accomplishment, if not before.

It is unfortunate you have felt it necessary to appeal to ridicule. I will leave our conversation here.Thank you for sharing your ideas.

Well that’s funny: an observer (you) who on the one hand equates herself to “an inanimate device. . . not an actual entity”, on the other hand wants to be treated as more than “an inanimate device”! Make up your mind.

Also demonstrably ridiculous is your repeated assertion that “signals”, i.e. intentional coded messages, are coming from the external environment. If you don’t mean intentional coded messages, then don’t call them signals.

And as I have repeatedly said, you can assert all you like that “agents” and “choices” exist, but you have no coherent view of the nature of reality backing up your assertions that “imaginings of the brain” (“not a part of the material world”) can be “actualize[d]”.

I have not equated myself to an inanimate device or abstract entity but have pointed out that Relativity does not only apply to sentient experiencing observers.

The term 'signal' can be applied to an input to a system occurring over time. An example is the signals received by a radio telescope. There is no implication by use of the word signal that the inputs to the telescope were sent intentionally by someone or something.

Georgina, what you actually mean by words and sentences can be hard to fathom:

“separating observer experience from independent external reality is important for physics. That doesn't cover it. What is important is separating the consequence of signal receipt and processing, which is some kind of output. Not necessarily experience as the 'observer' could be an inanimate device, material or in a calculation merely abstract not an actual entity.” (Georgina Woodward replied on Jul. 24, 2018 @ 21:40 GMT )

Despite its common mis-usage, the word “signal” means an intentional coded message, coded information. There is a big difference between “information” and “coded information”. There is no pre-coded information coming from the external environment (except if it has been deliberately coded).

'Output' is not the ideal word choice, 'product' is better. 'Product' is more easily understood as being something new and different (to the system prior to receipt and processing of the input), while it can still remain within the system.

As I said, discounting laws of nature and the environment as causative factors, you are left with nothing. You have no “mechanism” for choice that is any different to laws of nature and the environment as causative factors: your “choice” is nothing but the appearance of choice. You are left hoping that choice (i.e. agency over the numbers) can emerge out of complexity.

Re “Evidence in favour of there being real choice is the evolution of brains able to problem solve and decide; providing a survival advantage”:

Georgina, you may as well believe in fairy tales. Vague, abstract concepts like “survival advantage” have no power over the numbers, you have to get down to tin tacks. And the “science” of chaos/complexity/emergence has zero, 0, no, nothing, zilch results: nothing emerges out of deterministic systems. If you can add algorithms to organise information in the system, then you might get something emerging, but then you have to ask where the algorithms came from, because they certainly didn’t emerge from a deterministic system. Where are the equivalent of algorithms (i.e. things that organise and make high-level conclusions about information, i.e. create new higher-level information) coming from Georgina?

If you believe yourself, i.e. if you “believe in” free will/ agency/ choice/ creativity, and I do believe myself, then you believe that physics is in some way wrong. But obviously, the equations of physics’ laws of nature are not wrong. So, I’m saying that the following is where physics has got it wrong:

1. Matter is not the numb, dumb, almost superfluous in the scheme of things (merely a blank carrier of information), substance we have assumed it to be; and

Re “Matter is not the numb, dumb, almost superfluous in the scheme of things (merely a blank carrier of information), substance we have assumed it to be” (see above post):

Here’s an example of a typical childish physicist suggesting that matter might be numb, dumb, and superfluous in the scheme of things:

“A common misunderstanding: In quantum teleportation, matter is NOT teleported. Instead, quantum information describing matter is teleported. Which raises the question: Are you the sum of your information?”, Brian Greene Twitter, 17th / 18th July 2018.

When will people [1] grow up and get over their absurd ideas about computers and robots?

True information exists in an unbroken chain of relationship right down to fundamental-level information like energy and momentum. All atomic and molecular interactions, including DNA interactions, are true information interactions.

On the other hand, the symbolic representation of information, found in books and computers/robots, breaks the chain of information relationship.

Computers/robots only process symbolic representations of information i.e. they don’t know what the symbols mean i.e. they don’t know what information is represented i.e. they are 100% numb and dumb.

Many people seem to assume that deterministic processes are the only possible solution to the riddle of the emergence of life. These people might look at a graphical representation of a deterministic cellular automata algorithm and say that something resembling life emerges. But this “miraculous emergence” is logically equivalent to the “miraculous emergence” of a straight line when the equation y=2x is plotted on the graph.

In fact, when it comes to atoms and molecules, their 1) creation, 2) continued existence, and 3) interactions are all quantum processes: they cannot be understood as deterministic processes. So it might reasonably be expected that, when it comes to cells, organs and living things, their 1) creation, 2) continued existence, and 3) interactions are also quantum processes, not deterministic processes.

A characteristic of quantum events is that new information, e.g. new numbers for one or more of the variables representing the outcome, has been added (by whom?) to the system. New information because this outcome number has not been arrived at by deterministic processes. But added by whom?: the creation of new information, e.g. the quantum assignment of new numbers to existing variables, is exactly the sort of outcome that might be expected if genuine agency existed.

In fact, the evidence seems to indicate that it is the continual creation and possession of new information (representable as new mathematical relationships, new algorithmic relationships, the assignment of new numbers to variables) that is the characteristic of atoms, molecules, and living things. The characteristic of new information is that it has not been deterministically caused by existing laws of nature and existing circumstances.

If agency does exist, then it is a natural thing. But there are only 3 possible contexts in which something called “agency” might exist:

1. A universe where 100% of all outcome variable numbers are determined by laws of nature interacting with the environment gives agency no role in producing outcomes. In this situation, “agency” can never be more than a label, or an illusion.

2. A universe where most outcome variable numbers are determined by laws of nature interacting with the environment, and the rest of the numbers are “random”, also gives agency no role in producing outcomes. In this situation too, “agency” can never be more than a label, or an illusion.

3. A universe where most outcome variable numbers are determined by laws of nature interacting with the environment, and the rest of the numbers are determined by agents. This is the only situation in which genuine “agency” can exist.

Genuine agency is analogous to laws of nature in its ability to determine outcome numbers. Therefore agency, if it exists, is a fundamental aspect of reality.

Marcel and Georgina, and a lot of other people too, have difficulty with the idea that agency could be a fundamental aspect of reality. As human beings we like to think that we are very special: the centre of the universe, the pinnacle of evolution.

Free will/agency is not lawful. If free will were lawful, then it wouldn’t be free will, it would be a sham [1].

Free will/agency is necessarily the ability to determine outcome numbers, just like law of nature relationships determine outcome numbers.

Law of nature outcomes (represented by numbers and variables) can be seen as being due to law of nature relationships (represented by equations).

Free will/agency outcomes can be seen as being due to (what we would represent as) the creation of a new number assignment relationship for a variable.

Therefore free will/agency is more fundamental than law of nature relationships because free will/agency actually creates new relationship. A free will event is a quantum event, because quantum events are the only events where new relationships “emerge”/are created.

Free will indicates that reality is very different to the crude vision of the nature of reality peddled by many physicists and philosophers.

1. Free will: "The power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate", https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/free_will

Observers are particles, atoms, molecules and living things; but not billiard balls, dry leaves blowing in the wind, clocks or inanimate recording devices. Only the particles, atoms and molecules that make up the billiard balls, dry leaves, clocks and inanimate recording devices are observers.

Observers in effect “look”, they have knowledge of a situation: this knowledge exists as point-of-view subjective experience. Observers have knowledge of the rest of reality via subjective experience of information relationships (we represent these information relationships as equations, algorithms and numbers). Naturally enough, particles, atoms and molecules do not have the structure to extract the high-level algorithmic/ logical knowledge, of their situation in the universe, that living things manage to extract.

John Archibald Wheeler was right: this is a universe of observer- participants. Billiard balls and clocks are neither observers nor participants/agents. But particles, atoms, molecules and living things are observer-agents

Even the Advaita Vedanta was right: there is a “oneness between the self and the Universe” [1].

1. In How cosmic is the cosmos?, Zeeya Merali, 31 July 2018, https://aeon.co/essays/can-buddhist-philosophy-explain-what-came-before-the-big-bang .

Information = knowledge = subjective experience of one or more relationships between categories, whereby every “higher” category is ultimately related to the most fundamental-level categories like energy and momentum. Every information category, even the most fundamental ones, can be defined as a relationship between other categories. So that information/knowledge is always contextual (i.e. related and categorised): information does not objectively exist without context (i.e. without relationship and categorisation), as if it were a binary digit in a vacuum.

How do we represent information:

The physical universe exists because of information relationships. But the relationships are not to be equated to the mathematical symbols we human beings use to represent them. We represent relationships symbolically as: (law of nature) equations, algorithms (these mainly exist in living things), and initial-value number assignments (where every measured number can ultimately be traced to simpler relationships between categories in which the “numerator” and “denominator” categories cancel out, leaving a number, which is a thing without a category).

What knows information and what creates information:

The universe itself creates and knows all the types of relationships (represented by human beings as equations, algorithms, numbers). More precisely, parts of the universe create and know relationships: i.e. agent-observers create and know relationships, where agent-observers are “information-integrated”: particles, atoms, molecules, and living things. This “creation” and “knowledge” are otherwise known as “free will” and “consciousness”.